Judge blocks plan to move FBI headquarters to Reagan Building
U.S. District Judge Theodore Chuang ruled that the Trump administration's move to divert funding and cancel a plan to move the FBI to Maryland was "arbitrary and capricious and not in accordance with law."
Updated on: August 17, 2026 / 9:53 PM EDT / CBS News
A federal judge in Maryland blocked the Trump administration's plan to relocate the FBI's proposed headquarters to the Ronald Reagan Building in Washington, D.C., after the Biden administration had announced a plan in 2023 to move the headquarters to Greenbelt, Maryland.
In July 2025, FBI Director Kash Patel announced that the bureau would instead relocate a few blocks away, stating that the Reagan Building offered "the most cost-effective and resource-efficient way to carry out our mission."
Last November, the state of Maryland sued Patel and the bureau, alleging that the Trump administration had attempted to "unlawfully sabotage" the 2023 plan and illegally divert funding that Congress had designated for the plan — over $323 million — away from it.
The FBI has been headquartered in downtown Washington at the J. Edgar Hoover Building since 1975, but structural problems have plagued it for the last 20 years.